Murder

I consider this exercise to be an energizer, but it’s also a great introductory acting exercise, especially for those who have never acted before. To begin, everyone sits in a circle and someone is secretly selected to be the murderer. I usually use a deck of cards, and I flag the Jack of Spades to be the “murder card”. Once the cards are dealt, if you have this card, you are the murderer. The selection process must be random if this is to work properly, as no one can know who the murderer is. The murderer then kills people in the circle by winking at them. If you are winked at (killed), you must wait a few seconds, then you must act out a death. The death can be as exaggerated as you wish, but it must be clear to the rest of the group how the death occurs. Some people choose to get shot with a gun, drink poison, have a heart attack, or stabbed, while others choose creative ways to die (literally ending up on the floor). The goal for the rest of the group, is to figure out who the murderer is and anyone can guess at any time who they think the murderer is, but if they guess incorrectly they too are killed, at which point they must act out a death. This exercise generates a lot of laughs, and by the end of the day, we congratulate each other by saying, “That was a great death!”